About Globe’s Fair Usage Policy

I’m not a subscriber of Globe, but my family and friends are. Yesterday, we were talking about the Fair Usage Policy and one my friends made a very, very valid point. I’m copying it down here straight from our Viber conversation.

It starts after we saw Globe’s infographic. This came from my friend who has an “unlimited” data plan from Globe:
“Ugh, that infographic is so argh! Ang condescending ng dating. And I am deeply offended by the fact that they are trying to dictate how I use the internet.

And that breakdown about how much Youtube or emails or FB posts comprise 3gb is like wtf.

Who the fuck are they to dictate what is proper use of the internet???!!!!!

Let’s crunch the numbers. (Let’s say) I subscribe to about 10 channels on Youtube. These channels regularly send out 5 to 10 to 15 minutes of content about one to three times per week. Say 15mins x 2vids x 4 weeks x 10 channels is 1200 minutes of Youtube a month, which is already over a third of the 3000 minutes of pure Youtube that comprises 3gb.

And I bet that 3000 minutes they offer isn’t HD Youtube and I watch Youtube on HD.

And this is legit Youtube, content specifically made for Youtube, not some bootleg copy of tv shows.

And of course I won’t only use my internet for Youtube. There’s high res pic downloads, social media, not to mention research PDFs, data files downloads from statistics sites like say BSP or NSO site.

They should recognize that there are legit heavy users among their subscribers and GIVE US OPTIONS if their network can’t handle it and not just cut our speeds based on some arbitrary usage amount.

I mean, ok fine, I understand I am a disproportionately heavy internet user. Give me options. Offer me a plan with higher monthly rate within reason, if I’m such a burden to your network. It seems they didn’t even try to understand why the heavy users use so much internet, and try to work around the situation. Don’t tell me 3k minutes of Youtube should be more than enough for me, I am to decide how to use something that I pay for.

It shows such a blatant disregard for their customers. And we’re not even talking about the screwed up billing system thing.

And it also feels backward. They are a telecommunications company. They should be coming up with ways to deliver faster internet speeds, on mobile at that, because that is the direction the world is going, that is the direction our society is going. We want to be connected, creating and sharing content. They are the forefront of making that happen, or they should be, and instead what they are coming up with is ways to keep that from happening.

For goodness sake, wala pa ngang Netflix sa Pinas sa lagay na to eh.

Sorry for ranting. It just riles me up terribly that my internet usage is deemed irresponsible and even called abusive and called a misuse. I subscribe to 25 active Youtube channels 15 of which release new episodes several times per month. I’m talking from a range of every day to 2x a week to every 2 weeks. Episodes that are 4 to 15 minutes long. They educate and entertain me. Tumblr fuels my creativity.

They speak of bandwidth as a scarce resource. Our internet speeds are a pittance compared to other countries, it’s not like the provision of the level of service we demand is technologically impossible. I don’t know the science or engineering but it feels like they didn’t make the necessary investment and are now putting the blame on users like me.”

I have to say, very valid points. You paid for unlimited data, you should get unlimited data.

Yes, which is really totally unfair. As my friend said, they should be finding ways to be able to support the demands of their users, and instead what they’re doing is discouraging their users from using to much data. To be fair, it’s not just Globe. Smart also has a data limit which half the limit of Globe (1.5gb) but so far I haven’t experienced slower speed pa even if my usage is twice their limit.